The Life-Changing Magic of Cashew Cream

Whenever people talk about why they could never give up dairy, normally you hear reasons like “but I’ll miss the cheeeese!” or “but I love ice cream so much!” and while I do love a good sharp cheddar and a nice bowl of pistachio ice cream, my dairy sticking point came from unusual suspects—half and half for my coffee and sour cream for my chili. These two items were what kept me from going dairy-free for years (even though I knew dairy made me feel not-so-great—it was worth it for a good cup of coffee!).

I literally couldn’t picture a world where I didn’t put a big glug of half and half in my coffee each morning or eat a bowl of chili without a dollop of sour cream. I’d tried all the plant-based alternatives in the supermarket, and, quite honestly, hated them all. I had decided that I was just going to have to be mostly dairy-free, except for my daily half and half and occasional sour cream. Life is too short to drink my coffee black.

And then, one day, I was out of half and half, and I did a desperate Google search for a plant-based coffee creamer recipe that I could make using pantry staples. A lot of recipes called for coconut milk or coconut oil (love coconut, but I’m a coffee purist, so no go) or almond milk (which I know from experience has some separation issues). And then I stumbled onto Cashew Coffee Creamer on Kitchen Treaty, and I thought, “Well, that’s something I’ve never tried before!” and went for it.

Dude. Life changed.

It looks like half and half. It’s thick, fatty, and creamy like half and half. It doesn’t separate or curdle. It doesn’t taste like coconut. It. Was. Perfect. Better than any of those $5 a pint plant-based coffee creamers on the market. With that first blitz in my blender, a love affair with cashews was born.

In the months since, I’ve turned cashews into sour cream (yup, it works!), ice cream (so gloriously buttery!), creamy salad dressings (best. ranch. ever.), queso (so spicy and yum!), alfredo sauce (much easier than making a bechamel sauce), and so many other things I’ve lost count. I have a whole other post coming up in a few weeks about cashew cheeses (ricotta, parmesan, feta, oh my!), but for now, we’ll stick to creamy uses.

Now, cashew cream is not a new idea and anyone who frequents any plant-based blogs, websites, or restaurants will probably know all about it. For some reason though, it hasn’t really entered the mainstream healthy eating community. We’re changing that today.

Trust me, this life-changing magic shouldn’t be exclusive to the plant-based and vegan communities. EVERYONE needs to make cashew cream. Omnivore or herbivore, you can use it and love it. And I’m going to show you exactly how. Watch the video below to get a full primer on using cashew cream, or scroll down for the text and photo version.

Before We Start: You’ll Need A Good Blender…

First things first: to do all this cashew cream magic, you’re going to need a good-quality, high powered blender. I’ve tried to do the cashew cream thing in my food processor, and it just doesn’t quite give you the same results (although, it does work just fine for cashew ricotta—which is supposed to be a little crumbly instead of smooth—more on that in my future cashew cheese post). I use my Ninja and it works beautifully. She’s seen more cashews than a cashew farmer.

…and Some Good Cashews.

You’ll want to get raw, unsalted cashews. The better quality (fresher, fattier, more delicious) your cashews, the better your end result will be. As a Nuts.com ambassador, I might be biased, but I think they have some of the best raw, organic cashews on the market (they aren’t sponsoring this post, BTW). I love that you can get bulk discounts from Nuts.com. Since I go through so many cashews in my house, buying in bulk saves me some serious cash!

You might be looking at the price of raw cashews and thinking, “Um, that’s WAY too expensive to use for something like coffee creamer.” Well, okay, you’re right, good quality nuts ain’t cheap. But, let’s break it down:

A pound of raw, organic cashews from Nuts.com is $12.99.

You can get about six pints of cashew cream from a pound of cashews, making it $2.17 per pint.

A pint of organic half and half in my area is $3.19 (I just looked it up).

And that’s all the math we’re going to be doing today.

First Step: Soak Your Cashews

No matter what your end result is going to be (from alfredo to ice cream), your first step will be to soak your cashews. Some folks have luck not soaking cashews—especially if you have a really high-powered blender and good quality cashews—but I’ve always had better luck with soaked cashews. There are three methods, all depending on how quickly you need ’em.

Overnight Soak—If you’re on the ball, cover one cup of raw cashews with cold water in a jar and let them soak overnight on the counter. In the morning, drain, rinse, and proceed with the recipe.

Quick Soak—Need your cashews fast? Pour boiling water over one cup of raw cashews in a jar and let them soak for about an hour before draining and rinsing. This is my favorite method.

Really Quick Soak—Need your cashews RIGHT NOW? Mix one cup of raw cashews with three cups of water in a saucepan. Bring to a boil and boil for 10 minutes. Drain, rinse, and proceed with your recipe. Sometimes this method doesn’t result in quite as smooth results in my experience, but it works in a pinch. You also might get a weird gray (or sometimes even purple!) gunky film on top with this method, just rinse it off before proceeding.

Second Step: Blend With Water

And that’s it. Pour the drained cashews into your blender with water (how much water depends on how thick you want the final result to be—see the recipe below for more info on this), and blend the dickens out of it until it’s crazy smooth and creamy. You’ve now made cashew cream! We make this a quart at a time in our house and use it for everything from casseroles to bisques—anywhere you’d use half and half or heavy cream.

Basic Cashew Cream

Description

Omnivores and herbivores alike will love this cashew cream. Use it anywhere you’d use heavy cream or half and half!

Ingredients

1 cup raw, unsalted cashews

Water

Instructions

Place cashews in a bowl or jar (I like using a wide-mouth quart mason jar) and cover with water. Let soak overnight (at least 6 hours).

Once soaking is finished, drain and rinse the cashews, and place in the basin of a high-powered blender. Add one cup of water for heavy cream thickness, two cups of water for half-and-half thickness, and three cups of water for milk thickness and blend on high until very smooth—about three minutes.

Store in covered container in the fridge for up to 10 days. The cream will get thicker as it cools.

Did you make this recipe?

Once you have the basic idea of cashew cream down pat, you can turn that glorious, velvety cream into all kinds of wonderful kitchen concoctions. Cashew cream holds up really well to heating and baking—no separating—so you can use it almost anywhere. Here are some of the favorite ways we use it in our house:

This is the recipe that started it all. I took one sip of my first cup of coffee doctored up with cashew cream, and I knew that I could make this dairy-free thing work for me. Over the past few months, I’ve tweaked this recipe to get it just to my liking, but you might need to tweak it (more or less sweetener, no vanilla, etc.) until you can make your perfect dairy-free cuppa.

Ingredients

Instructions

Place cashews in a bowl or jar (I like using a wide-mouth quart mason jar) and cover with water. Let soak overnight (at least 6 hours).

Once soaking is finished, drain and rinse the cashews, and place in the basin of a high-powered blender. Add in two cups of water, the maple syrup, vanilla, and sea salt and blend on high until very smooth—about three minutes.

Store in covered container in the fridge for up to 10 days. The cream will get thicker as it cools.

Did you make this recipe?

I would never scoop this Cashew Sour Cream into a bowl and serve it to the world’s foremost connoisseur of sour cream (if there was such a thing), and say, “I BET YOU CAN’T TASTE A DIFFERENCE.” This definitely doesn’t taste like sour cream on it’s own. But when it’s used on things like a great bowl of chili or tacos, it works perfectly. The tanginess of the lemon and vinegar add that tartness that sour cream does, and the texture is perfectly creamy and cool.

Ingredients

Instructions

Place cashews in a bowl or jar (I like using a wide-mouth quart mason jar) and cover with water. Let soak overnight (at least 6 hours).

Once soaking is finished, drain and rinse the cashews, and place in the basin of a high-powered blender. Add in 1/2 cup of water, the lemon juice and zest, the apple cider vinegar, the maple syrup, and the salt and blend on high until very smooth—about three minutes.

Refrigerate until cold (about an hour). The cream will get thicker as it cools. Store in covered container in the fridge for up to 10 days.

Did you make this recipe?

When my husband first dipped some baby carrots in this ranch, he told me, without hesitation, that this was the best ranch dressing he’d ever had—and I tend to agree. Ranch has this reputation of being this bad-for-you junk food, but this ranch dressing couldn’t be further from that.

Cashew Ranch Dressing

Description

While you may think of ranch as junk food, this Cashew Ranch Dressing is anything but!

Ingredients

1 cup raw, unsalted cashews

Water

2 tablespoons mayo (vegan mayo is fine)

Juice and zest of 1 lemon

1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar

1 teaspoon garlic powder

1 teaspoon onion powder

1/2 teaspoon black pepper

1/2 teaspoon dried dill or 1 teaspoon fresh minced dill

1/2 teaspoon dried chives or 1 tablespoon fresh minced chives

1 teaspoon sea salt

Instructions

Place cashews in a bowl or jar (I like using a wide-mouth quart mason jar) and cover with water. Let soak overnight (at least 6 hours).

Once soaking is finished, drain and rinse the cashews, and place in the basin of a high-powered blender. Add 1/2 cup of water, the mayo, the lemon juice and zest, the apple cider vinegar, garlic powder, onion powder, black pepper, dill, chives and salt and blend on high until very smooth—about three minutes.

Store in covered container in the fridge for up to 10 days. The dressing will get thicker as it cools.

Did you make this recipe?

How do you make a good Alfredo sauce without cream or cheese? Cashews and nutritional yeast! Nutritional yeast is available almost everywhere now (even Trader Joe’s sells it). If you’ve never used it before, it looks like fish food (#realtalk) and has a slightly cheesy, nutty flavor to it. A lot of plant-based folks use it in huge amounts, but I found that a little bit goes a long way (and too much can be really overpowering).

Description

Ingredients

Instructions

Place cashews in a bowl or jar (I like using a wide-mouth quart mason jar) and cover with water. Let soak overnight (at least 6 hours).

Once soaking is finished, drain and rinse the cashews, and place in the basin of a high-powered blender. Add in 3/4 cup water, garlic, nutritional yeast, and sea salt and blend on high until very smooth—about three minutes. Pour over hot pasta and toss to coat.

Store in covered container in the fridge for up to 10 days. The dressing will get thicker as it cools.

Did you make this recipe?

So it doesn’t get more cheese-tastic than queso, right? I mean, the name is literally translated to just “cheese.” But the truth is, if you think about the flavors of queso, it’s often a lot less about cheese and a lot more about cumin and chile peppers and spice. This creamy queso is cheeseless, but it’s the BEST with some really good tortilla chips. It’s not an exact replica of your traditional queso, but it does a pretty darn good job of filling a craving when you have one (and it’s BOMB on quesadillas).

Instructions

Place cashews in a bowl or jar (I like using a wide-mouth quart mason jar) and cover with water. Let soak overnight (at least 6 hours).

Once soaking is finished, drain and rinse the cashews, and place in the basin of a high-powered blender. Add 1 cup of water, the nutritional yeast, the salt, the garlic powder, the cumin, the chili powder, the turmeric, the chipotle in adobe, and the sriracha and blend on high until very smooth—about three minutes.

Cashew Ice Cream

Description

Thanks to cashews, this dairy-free Cashew Ice Cream is super-creamy and super-delicious.

Ingredients

1 cup raw, unsalted cashews

Water

1 15-ounce can full fat coconut milk

1/2 cup maple syrup

2 teaspoons vanilla paste or 2 vanilla beans, scraped

1 teaspoon salt

Instructions

Place cashews in a bowl or jar (I like using a wide-mouth quart mason jar) and cover with water. Let soak overnight (at least 6 hours).

Once soaking is finished, drain and rinse the cashews, and place in the basin of a high-powered blender. Add in the coconut milk, the maple syrup, vanilla paste, and salt and blend on high until very smooth—about three minutes.

Transfer to a freezer safe container (I like a loaf pan) and freeze until solid—about six hours.

Did you make this recipe?

Like I said above, these recipes aren’t even close to all the uses for cashew cream, but hopefully these will give you a good primer into the glorious world of cashews! Stay tuned in the next few weeks for a whole separate post on making nut cheeses using cashews—you’ll be amazed at how tasty they are!

If there are no chunky bits (like the garlic the alfredo sauce), you can just stir stuff in afterward. I tend to make a big batch of plain/basic cashew cream, and then turn it into sour cream and coffee creamer.

I’d say it’s WAY more neutral-flavored than almond milk creamer. I can’t handle almond milk creamer in my coffee, because I think it just makes my coffee taste like almonds—I like almonds, but I want COFFEEEEEEEEEE, you know? I think the flavor of cashew creamer is very mild!

I love you! I have a dairy allergy and spend a fortune on so-so store bought non-dairy products. I’ve always been leery of trying cashew cream, but you make it so simple! I’m so making Alfred this week!

I have a big tub of roasted, salted cashews that I bought before my husband realized they upset his stomach. Do you think I could turn those into a passable cashew cream? Well, it looks like most of these recipes call for 1 cup of cashews. I have way more than that on hand, so if a roasted, salted cashew cream is a complete flop, they haven’t all gone to waste!

Raw cashews are really important to achieve the neutral flavor and smooth texture these recipes require. You CAN use roasted cashews, but the cashew flavor will be much more pronounced and it won’t be as smooth and creamy. And using salted nuts is not really a good idea because the salt content will ruin most of the recipes. But hey, you could always try a small batch of one of them and see how you like it. It might be the flavor profile you like.

You could make cashew butter, in the blender, if you wanted to. I’ve done it in both a food processor and my big strong Vita-Mix blender. There are many recipes for it on Pinterest. I’ve added salt, maple syrup and cinnamon.

Thank you so much for posting plant based meals. I recently went plant-based (vegan) for health reasons and I was so bummed that I wouldnt be able to stalk wholefully recipes anymore so I am over the moon about this post! Will you be revisiting some of your old recipes in a plant-based light? Would love to see your thoughts on vegan meet substitutes for your salads and etc.

Thanks so much for the shout-out, Cassie! Funnily enough I have been a cashew coffee creamer freak for awhile now but I am only now really venturing into other areas with cashew cream and I agree, cashews really are SO versatile, they deserve to be far more mainstream! LOVE this amazing resource you’ve created and I can’t wait to try cashew sour cream next.

I just have an inexpensive Regal Blender and it works fine for this. I make cashew cream daily because I love my decaf coffee. (decaf because I love my coffee too much) Don’t forget to soak those cashews for a good 24 hours first to get it really creamy.

Thanks for this awesome post. I am stirring towards a plant-based lifestyle and I was sad to lose my cream in my coffee and cheese. The almond creamer just doesn’t cut it. Very excited to try all these recipes!

Okay, this might be a weird question. But I have some lightly salted cashews. Do you think I can just rinse them off prior to soaking them? Or would they still be too salty? I guess it might be worth a go in a small batch.

I’ve never tried! I do make it pretty frequently into ricotta cheese—which can be used similarly to cottage cheese in cooking (although I wouldn’t recommend just eating it with a spoon like you do cottage cheese).

I can’t add this to my ingredient list as the BF is allergic to nuts (cashew, almond, hazelnut and walnut are the worst) but I will totally come back to it when my vegan friends will come over! I always felt my chili was not complete without a big dollup of sour cream, not to mention my other go-to recipe for creamy mushroom tagliatelle, and now I have a great substitute! Thank you!

Cassie, I made the cashew ice cream this weekend for Easter dessert because half of my family is dairy-free and it was a huge hit with everyone, dairy-free or not! It was “just barely icy” like you said, but it was THEE creamiest ice cream I’ve ever had and the coconut milk made it so rich and delicious. I think I’m going to try the cashew coffee creamer next!

I love you! I have a dairy allergy and spend a fortune on so-so store bought non-dairy products. I’ve always been leery of trying cashew cream, but you make it so simple! I’m so making Alfred this week!

Hey! Thank you for these recipes! Did I do something wrong? I made the coffee creamer. When I wanted to try it, I heated it up in the microwave and used it in my tea. It was pretty good, except some settled on the bottom of my cup. Which is the same problem I have with store-bought coconut milk creamer. I did shake it up. Is settling natural?

I would recommend trying to blend even longer then. Sometimes that happens to me when I don’t quite blend it long enough. It looks nice and smooth, but it’s not quite there yet. Hopefully that solves it! 🙂

Thanks so much, I have used cashews in place of the cream in Butter Chicken Masala which led me to exploring further and finding this page with all your recipes. Just wanted to say price is now $13.99 per pound at nuts.com, plus $5.99 shipping.

Just stumbled onto this post and it is awesome! Talk about an all-inclusive guide to cashew cream! I recently made it for the first time to make a cream pasta (ohsheglows recipe) and I can’t believe I hadn’t tried it before. My husband is lactose intolerant and I’m just salivating thinking of all the recipes I stopped making which I need to try with cashew cream! Going to try the coffee creamer first through as the non-dairy ones at the grocery store always let me down. I already prefer maple syrup in my coffee so your recipe sounds delicious!

Love these recipes! I went vegan and I had a choice to upgrade 1 kitchen appliance so I chose the food processor. I tried to do this in my new $600 Kitchen Aid food processor. Epic fail! I blended about 3-4 minutes, scraped it down 3-4 times and still lumpy! I kept blending and it just would not get smooth. I have a Kitchen Aid blender I want to try next but I am worried about the lumps. What constitutes a “high powered” blender? Is it the motor size? I really can’t afford to buy a $400 blender. Will the one I have work?

Sorry you’re struggling—this definitely is more of a job for a blender than a food processor (although you will get plenty of awesome use out of it, so good investment)! A high-powered blender is usually listed as “professional” level. The standard Kitchen-Aid blender won’t cut it, but they do have a professional line that should do the trick.

I can’t wait to try every one of these! Thank you for posting so many! I do have one question, can another “milk” be substituted for the coconut milk in the ice cream? I am allergic to coconut 🙁 but would LOVE to try this cashew milk ice cream! Thank you again!

I have to say I’m impressed. I’ve tried other nacho cheese recipes and they weren’t that great. Feared I would never be able to have nachos again. I made the Cashew Queso with a couple of modifications since I didn’t have the chiles in adobo sauce and it was outstanding. I also made the cashew coffee creamer and it is way better than I expected. I feel like I need to use a little more than the amount of regular dairy creamer but it’s way better than the store bought almond milk creamer. Anyway thank you for these recipes!! Can’t wait to try the others.

Thank you for the great recipes. I have A LOT of cashew paste left over from making mylk, which I have frozen. Would I be able to use that instead, especially for ice cream? I find so many recipes starting with raw cashews, which is great and I do use, but would like to find some use for the paste. Thanks!

Finally accepted that I am lactose intolerant (it runs in the family), I have been looking for a substitute for sour cream. I made the basic cashew cream and added grated garlic, chopped onion, 1 tsp homemade taco seasoning and salt and pepper. It tasted awesome on top of my taco salad. Now I am anxious to try the coffee milk and alfredo sauce ?

For the first time I’ve made cashew cream sauce suggested with a vegan stuffed red pepper dish. I’ve made it all and am now puzzled if I’m serving hot stuffed red peppers and cold cream sauce … seems weird … can I heat the cream sauce?

Hi, I’m sensitive to both dairy AND coconut which is a real bummer when you want something creamy! So I’m very excited about this! Question- can I just use the water used for the overnight soak as opposed to tossing it and using new water? I always try to preserve nutrients lost during boiling/soaking/etc so just curious if there’s a reason we want to discard the soak water. Thanks!!

Great recipes! I was despairing about not being able to find a milk alternative for my tea but your cashew nut creamer is fantastic, I think it makes my tea taste better. I have drastically reduced the maple syrup to about 1 TBSP or less and increased the water a bit so I guess it is a little more like slightly sweet cashew milk. Thanks for making my efforts to become dairy-free a little bit easier.

OMG! I am vegan, and I am also allergic to soy, dairy and wheat making it harder find yummy vegan options. I love coffee with creamer, but have been forced to drink it black for years now. I made your coffee creamer recipe this morning and it is amazing! It tastes great, I know what ingredients are in it, and it is healthy too. You are a life saver.

I made your sour cream recipe last night and put it on red beans and rice. So good. Thanks again!

I just want to thank you for these recipes. I have been searching forever for an alternative to coffee creamer and I honestly am in LOVE with this cashew creamer! I just received my second order from nuts.com per your suggestion (they are AMAZING btw so thank you for that as well!) and am making batch number three of this delicious and super healthy alternative. THANK YOU!

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Hello, Friends!

My name is Cassie, and I want to help you eat better. I believe eating whole foods can change your life (it did mine), and I believe you can do it without losing your mind, going broke, or eating like a bird.

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